TALES OF THE REVOLUTION by _Michael Artzibashev_, translated by _Percy
Pinkerton_. (B. W. Huebsch.) The five tales by Artzibashev included in
this volume all have the same quality of bitter irony and mordant
self-analysis. The psychological revelation of the mind that has made
the later phases of the present Russian Revolution possible is complete,
and I know of no book that presents more clearly and truthfully the
rudderless pessimism of these particular spiritual reactions. Such
courageous dissection of the diseased mind has never been undertaken in
American or English fiction, and though its realism is appalling, it is
healthful in its naked frankness.

THE FRIENDS by _Stacy Aumonier_ (The Century Co.). When "The Friends"
was published two years ago in The Century Magazine, it was evident at
once that an important new short-story writer had arrived. The homely
humanity of his characterization was but the evidence of a rich
imaginative talent that found self-expression in the more quiet ways of
life. I said at the time that I believed "The Friends" to be one the
two best short stories of 1915, and others felt it to be the best story
of the year. To "The Friends" have now been added in this volume two
other stories of almost equal distinction,--"The Packet" and "'In the
Way of Business.'" While Mr. Aumonier has a certain didactic intention
in these stories, he has kept it entirely subordinate to the artistry of
his exposition, and it is the few characters which he has added to
English fiction that we remember after his somewhat obvious moral has
been conveyed. His short stories have the same flavor of belated
Victorianism that one enjoys in the novels of William De Morgan, and he
is equally noteworthy in his chosen field.

IRISH IDYLLS by _Jane Barlow_ (Dodd, Mead & Co.). This new edition of
"Irish Idylls" should introduce the admirable studies of Miss Barlow to
a new audience that may not be familiar with what was a pioneer volume
in its day. Published in 1893, it almost marked the beginning of the
Irish literary movement, and so many fine writers followed Miss Barlow
that she has been most unfairly concealed by their shadows. Her studies
of the lives and deaths, joys and sorrows, of Connemara peasants are
none the less real because they are the product of observation by one
who did not live among them. They show, as Miss Barlow says, that "there
are plenty of things beside turf to be found in a bog." It is true th